• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Ninja Notes

Let us help you teach like a ninja!

  • Engaging Lessons
  • Teaching Strategies
  • Classroom Tips
  • Free Resources
  • Shop
  • Contact Us
    • Privacy Policy

BrainNinjasWP

5 Amazing Canadian Women Your Students Should Know About

by BrainNinjasWP

You don't have to wait for Women's History Month to learn about amazing Canadian women. There are so many creative, intelligent and trailblazing women in the world. I think many people don't realize how many fascinating women we have in our own country. Come learn about these women that you can add to your lessons any time of year.

You don’t have to wait for Women’s History Month to learn about amazing Canadian women. There are so many creative, intelligent and trailblazing women in the world. I think many people don’t realize how many fascinating women we have in our own country. Come learn about these women that you can add to your lessons any time of year.

[Read more…] about 5 Amazing Canadian Women Your Students Should Know About

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Canadian History, Canadian Trailblazers, Historic Women, Indigenous People in Canada, Teachers Pay Teachers, Women's History

Our Favourite Books to Use on Valentine’s Day

by BrainNinjasWP

Books are for everyone and even your upper elementary students love to enjoy a great book. These books are themed around Valentine's Day, but they aren't too romantic for school. Check out our list of Valentine's Day books for your upper elementary classroom.

We love to read to our students, but they are in grades four and five, so we try to avoid books about romance when we look for Valentine’s Day books, but sometimes it just sneaks in. Quite often, the books are too young for our students, but when that happens, we encourage our students to read to their younger buddies. Come read through this list of Valentine’s Day books we’ve collected over the years.

[Read more…] about Our Favourite Books to Use on Valentine’s Day

Filed Under: Classroom Tips Tagged With: Book Recommendations, books, Drama Circles, Holidays and Seasonal, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Ideas

How to Have Snow Much Fun With These Snow Activities

by BrainNinjasWP

Have snow much fun with all these winter themed snow activities for your upper elementary classroom. There are snow activities for writing, reading, art and classroom community building. Come check out the big list of winter themed activities.

When you live in a winter climate like northern Canada, the opportunities to do activities related to snow are endless. We try to build weather-related snow activities into our classes wherever possible. We teach in upper elementary, but we’ve used some of these activities with our younger buddies and some we’ve challenged ourselves. Come check out these snow activities that will keep you busy all winter.

[Read more…] about How to Have Snow Much Fun With These Snow Activities

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Art, Art Lessons, Classroom Community, Collaborative Posters, Holidays and Seasonal, Logic Puzzles, Teachers Pay Teachers, Winter, Winter Activities, Winter Art, Winter Art Projects, Winter Books, Winter Classroom Activities, Winter Language Arts, Winter Logic Puzzles, Winter Math, Winter Puzzles, Writing, Writing Prompts

How to Demystify Math With These 7 Algebra Activities

by BrainNinjasWP

If you are avoiding algebra activities in your math class, we're here to help. We have several lessons and activities that can take the mystery out of your introductory algebra lessons and get you feelling confident about teaching it. We've got activities for patterns and algebra that you can use with any resources! Come have a read today!

When we hear that we have to do algebra activities, the fear is real. Algebra is this haunting reminder of high school. When I was becoming a teacher, I didn’t want my negative experiences with math to influence how I taught it or, more importantly, how my students learned it.

In university, I was put in a “special” math class designed for education students who needed to refine their math skills. Truthfully, it was for us creatives who didn’t take enough math during high school and university. At first, I was scared of the class, but as the class progressed, I realized how lucky I was to be there. Not only did I get over my fear of math, I learned how to break down math concepts in so many different ways that I could teach it to any student. Come learn some of the ways to break down introductory algebra with these algebra activities.

[Read more…] about How to Demystify Math With These 7 Algebra Activities

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons, Teaching Strategies Tagged With: Algebra, First Year Teachers, first-year teachers, interactive math notebooks, Math, math error analysis, math errors, Math Lessons, math manipulatives, Math Worksheets, Mathematics, new service teacher, new teacher, new teachers, Pattern Lessons, Patterns

15 Ways to Engage Readers During Your Read-Aloud

by BrainNinjasWP

If your administration thinks reading aloud to your students is a waste of time, you need to read this post full of ways to engage readers and teach your language arts outcomes. It goes far beyond listening skills. Come get a whole bunch of ideas on how to get the most out of your read aloud.

It seems that there is less and less time for reading aloud to your students, but if you use that read-aloud to engage your readers, you can teach so many different skills. Kids (and adults) of all ages love to be read to. If that weren’t the case, there wouldn’t be a thriving industry of audiobooks.

Administrators want teachers to focus their time on literacy and numeracy. Things like read-alouds seem like “entertainment,” but there is so much value in reading aloud to children. Come learn how we turn every read-aloud into a lesson (without our students even knowing it).

[Read more…] about 15 Ways to Engage Readers During Your Read-Aloud

Filed Under: Teaching Strategies Tagged With: books, First Year Teachers, first-year teachers, fluency, Guided Reading, Guided Reading Instruction, Listening Skills, new service teacher, new teacher, new teachers, read aloud, Reading, Reading Activities, reading comprehension, reading strategies

Create These 5 Fantastic Devices That Move

by BrainNinjasWP

Are you teaching a unit about simple machines or things that move? Use these tried and tested recipes to help get you started with student friendly instructions for devices that your students can build and test as part of their science units or makerspace. Come have a read!

One of the best sciences units includes making devices that move. One of the best things about teaching science is having students create amazing things when they are just left with their knowledge and their creativity. We love to foster this type of learning in our classroom.

If you teach simple machines, then there are so many different opportunities to have students create and build exciting contraptions. We pulled together a list of ideas and a few of our favourite recipes for devices that move to make your search quick and painless.

[Read more…] about Create These 5 Fantastic Devices That Move

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons Tagged With: Alberta science, Design Process, devices that move, Makers, Makerspace, Makerspaces, science, Science Lessons, Simple Machines

« Previous Page
Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Most Recent

  • If you are looking for some simple classroom games for elementary classrooms to calm the mood or boost the energy, try these out. Learn how we use silly classroom games to help with transitions, teach regulation, teach teamwork and encourage patience in our classroom.
    Silly Classroom Games to Break Up the Day
    Teaching is stressful. It can be...
  • You can excite your elementary students to learn French by teaching them all about French Canadian celebrations. We put together lessons and activities that can help inspire your students about French culture while you teach the basics of the French language. These lessons are designed for teachers who are not native speakers so come learn more.
    How to Learn French With French Canadian Celebrations
    Every year, Francophone communities across Canada...
  • Create these adorable watercolour love trees for Valentine's Day, World Kindness Day, Earth Day or Pink Shirt Day. They make a great bulletin board and our post features step by step instructions for your elementary classroom. Come read the whole post.
    How to Make Valentine's Day Love Trees
    Do you need a Valentine's Day...

Before Footer

Looking for something?

Footer

Copyright © 2026 · Wellness Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.AcceptReject Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT